Ok lets dig deeper into what an IM: Stargazer could potentially look like if indeed it was an MMO, but staying as an RTS-MMO. Now you can make it into a good solid MMO, there are a lot of things you can do to, like having a good working economy, some insane customizations, with units colours, perhaps ships that come with special abilities... Aliances,, massive PvP battles having to fight in space before you start landing ground invasion forces, rolling out new units every couple months, easierly accessble new content to everyone, expanding storylines becomes a lot easier... I do think that we shouldn't have "Forced PVP" on anyone though because they can get really frustraiting, especially when your in the middle of doing something and getting interupted because of some E-Jerk wants to pvp someone stroke his own ego lol... Planets have to be diverse and having millions of them for everyone... a constant persistant world of some kind as well, with perhaps pockets of instances for various missions, story telling stuff like that...

Lets take a larger look at what the Universe could look like from an MMO perspective. A Large Persistent universe that we all start from, naming, colonizing our first planet, building structures and basically just starting up our first planet in our great empires before spreading out to grab many of the millions of planets out there. As this is an MMO, time could be slowed down, so what normally takes a really short time to build up colonies and ships and capturing 4 of 5 planets in the first 20 minutes of the game could take a lot longer, to give a sense of real progression.

You could have it where there is certain research developments which improve research training time if you like, there is no leveling up or any of that BS, we dont need it, the ships themselves level up through combat experience which could increate HP's, rate of fire, improved targeting which could give tiny bonus to damage out put, stuff like that for units. For the player themselves it comes in the form of research development, you can have it so things train in real time or something or close to real time training, obviously there are games that have done this already one most notably being EVE-Online, but you can adopt that system quite easerly to work in an RTS game with research development, that way if you get annihilated by PVP, you dont loose your entire progression you've just spent months on getting, you never loose your homeworld but it can still get attacked maybe, and you still have all your research, you just have to rebuild everything again

Instances could push new storylines having to make you go investigate certain spacial anomalies to find something that will change goverments or lead you onto learning new clues to find the secrets of the universe, find new alien races, new technology, from new structure blue prints to planetary defense structures and ship design loadouts. The instances enable players to reach the PVE area's of what the game has to offer and perhaps even capture new worlds this way.

Customization and personalaization would probably be a big part, in colour schemes, design and look of ships, as well as the full customizations that you unlock with the ship and unit researches, this is one of the things that made IG2 so good, was be able to develop and load out of the ships, exactly how you wanted, and this would have to continue and be more complex obviously with todays enhancement in gaming.

Just a few idea's on how I think an MMO could be applied to the IG universe... I'll prolly add some other idea's later on... and if anyone has some idea's how we can make an MMO-RTS without destroying what made IG2 one of the best strategy games ever made.

I agree for a lot of think in your message, but I think if you wanna develope only a MMO game, you may limit the potential of the game, honestly, I think a MMO game is TOO slow, and could be grind, and maybe as a game it's too wide to be played only on-line,in my opinion should be done a version lite, for the web, to promote the game, but then the game need to be installed on a pc to play in sigle player, with a dvd(a lot of Dvd) or blu-ray, and in the version for single palyer iclude the multiplayer version, with a different mission maps and other things!

Yep I feel the same way my friend, I think that this game should really be a game thats singleplayer with multiplayer in it, not forced multiplayer anyway. I talked about this stuff mainly because I think Digital Reality are wanting to do it that, or thinking about doing it that way, so i put together some ideas on what they could do. I personally of course would prefer if it wasn't just an online only game, because when I think of a RTS game, i think along the lines of Imperium Galactica II, and Command & Conquer... Having an online game does create some issues that can be anihilated by having a proper singleplayer experience..... Most people really love RTS games to have a skirmish mode for example... I know what you mean about grinding, but RTS games aren't RPGs, there is no WoW or Guild Wars grinding in games like this so I dont think you would have to worry about that all too much if it did turn into an MMO...

As a long time fan of Imperium Galactica 1 + 2 + Nexus think that making a Stargazer into a MMO would end up a bad idea. I personally think that it should be made into a single player game with multiplayer available as it was with IG2 as that is what most people who know the IG games will be looking for.

Something you can play for a few hours after work, on the weekend or a day off. Not something you will be worrying about while not able to be online wondering if your planet will be invaded or wanting the be able to start your next research. If it was made into a MMO it would just end up like so many other's out there such as Trivian, Tribe Wars, Age of Empires Online, Stronghold Online. Although I imagine it would look much nicer and be set in space.

A MMO would make it a completely different game. You'd have to wait days, if not weeks for you fleet to arrive at a planet (otherwise someone could conquer the whole galaxy in a day or 2) and that is not how IG games should be played.

Turing Stargazer into a MMO would scare off alot of old time fans and would not get the recognition that it would as a single player game.

I have to admit, I would love a modern day Imperium galactica II game... Going by that trailer, it looks like there it is going to be an RTS game perhaps as one of the options on the main screen says to go back to galaxy map... this can only be a good thing...

I'm not totally against the idea, and i've been playing IG2 for 12 years now, and how much i would love it just to be a true sequel.. an MMO does have its advantages though.. and it would be a AAA tittle MMO not those free-to-play messes like age of empires online and what not, but i understand what your saying and your concerns Jimo...

why I'm not disappointed with the announcement that it will not give imperium galactica thirdbecause I copied imperium galactica 3 a long time and because I do not play a lot of the industry expected.constantly being developed to the customer over, there are many examples of this.if I want to play a science fiction MMO, then I play eve-online. I hardly think that it so complex and so largecreated universe could, as it is in eve-online.Finally, the stand for years used to have because where they are today.I will terminate with safety nor my longstanding accounts because of the new imperium galactica mmo.for this I have come a long way too much.I wonder where you want to take all the players here who still want to play an online game in outer space.with the safety not of eve-online come to you.Read here how you can clear the people want one imperium galactica 3, which should be the same as the second part. only with today's improved opportunitiesbut on the topic, develop the customer over and then wonder why it does not like to play it.

well at this point its all speculation weather this game is going to be a MMO or not... but figured i'd start a thread on this anyway... I would rather it wasn't an MMO myself as well...too many MMOs out there right now as it is

@Godan72 It's a good thing I can speak German ^^. But please do keep posting the google translate of your posts, so that the other users can read what you are posting about . I understand that you have some disappointment that it will not be an "IG3" game in the traditional 4X sense. But, there will be 4X elements with a new twist included. We definitely do not expect you to give up your eve online account, nor do we want to develop a copy of eve online. As you said, they took years to get where they are now, and we don't expect eve online players to coming running to the new IG MMO.

That being said, we want to take the time to develop the game further than what it was before, which includes online and multiplayer. The online aspect is especially important because of the way we want to release and develop the game further. It is much easier to do ad hoc bugfixes or changes after user feedback for example, than with a traditional pc game.

Plus, see it as a advantage - you can be among the first to play in the universe and make your mark on it

Well you understand German because the Google translator not always translated as I wrote it.What I wanted to tell you have always wanted is that I Digital Reality has always been one of the best development studioshave held.Many happy hours I spent with IG2 and it can now luckily still play.My first game of you was Reunion for Amiga IG2 was advance far in his time and to this day there is no better 4x game.My question is why did not you then just did next?The games that you have brought out danch have never interested me more.Are "Spidy, Snowman, Genesis, Tsc and Fable" present again in your new game?I wish you much success with your new project and all the best for the future.As you might already do it right, the one where you can then there are Sciens-fiction games.

@ eccy, can you give us any more details on weather or not this game is going "play" like? will be like X3:Reunion or EVE-Online like? or like how IG2 was, but in an mmo setting? city building/simulation? ground and space battles etc? any more info would be greatly appreciated